PRINCIPAL'S MESSAGE

Statewide Principal’s Conference 

On Tuesday and Wednesday of this week I was out of the school attending the Statewide Principal’s Conference at the Exhibition Centre in the city. Over two days, we heard from a number of guest speakers, including the Minister for Education, Benjamin Carroll. Some of the key themes of the conference were student behaviour, the importance of phonics in learning to read and staff and student wellbeing. A big thankyou to our team at Plenty Parklands for continuing to run the school at such a high level in my absence.

Prep Playground

Today marks the grand opening of our new Prep and Year 1 playground beside Block D.  For the past few days, I have been out during break times allowing each of the year levels to trial the playground. 

 As of this afternoon at 3:30pm, it will be open to our school community. Currently on our mini trampoline we have a rule of five jumps per person and only one student on the trampoline at any one time.  If you chose to use our playground before or after school, please help us to train your children to stick to these rules to enable a fair go for all.

Whole School Performance

We are deep in the preparation stages for our Term 3 whole school performance, which will be held at Plenty Ranges Art Centre.  Ms. Emery and Ms. Thomas have been running main cast member auditions, and just today have announced to our student body the successful cast members.  

We have eight main cast member rolls for each night, 2 under studies for each night and currently two extras. The exciting theme of “Library of Lost Connections” is now in place and more information to families will follow.

Creative Minds

Our Creative Minds extension program continues every Thursday in the school conference room. Yesterday I sat in as the students explored Ancient Egypt and shared their high level thinking around topics such as politics. This program is one of many opportunities provided to our students to continue to challenge them in their learning. Another extension opportunity coming up soon is our ICAS Testing, which is now available for online enrolments. This provides a great opportunity for your child to test themselves against students across the country. 

New Staff Member

This week we are delighted to announce that we have a new staff member joining our team. Harriet is a 12-week-old Cobber Dog that is flying in from Queensland next Friday and will be staying with Ms. Shelden. Our students will see Harriett around the school in training during Term 3, and she will be on official duties in the Wellbeing team come Term 4.

Fundraising

Last Wednesday the 28th of May, we held a whole school fundraiser to raise money for the Make a Wish Foundation. As the Principal of the school, I have been blown away by the fantastic support of such an important cause. This fundraiser continues to the end of term.  Currently the Blue Bandicoots (Ladd House) is in first place, having filled 1½ jars with silver coins.  In second place is Gold Goannas (Scanu House).  In equal third place is Red Rosellas (Macdonald House) and green Grasshoppers (McInerney House)

David Whewell | Principal